Charlaine talks about Christmas decorating on her blog

...Getting the Christmas stuff out of the attic is a group effort. This year, we commandeered Oldest Son and his friend, when they were home for Thanksgiving. Oldest Son, as usual, commented unfavorably on our storage methods and the amount of mouse droppings in the attic, which is over the car port. We, as usual, ignored him.

After that, I pretty much fly solo, with occasional help from Middle Son and Daughter. Though someone else puts up the tree, I decorate it, and hang the other Christmas stuff around the house. Then comes the big job. Our largest Christmas effort is the Snow Village. I started collecting these ceramic houses over twenty-five years ago, and as you can imagine, I now have quite a few. Setting up my Snow Village is a huge undertaking, since I’m not exactly Miss Home Décor. (You should see BFF Paula’s Snow Village. Puts mine to shame.) I get the kids or my husband to haul in the folding tables from the tool shed, I get them set up, I clean them, I get out the old white sheets to cover them, and then the real work begins.

Each house has to be extricated from its Styrofoam shell, placed just right, and arranged in a logical setting. This is where the imagination comes in. These are ceramic houses, and businesses, and churches. You could put them anywhere, and they’re not going to look like a real town. But I have something specific in mind every year, and I put in a ridiculous amount of time getting it done. There’s downtown; and this year, the Christmas parade is taking place in downtown Snow Village. There’s a cross street that runs to the town neighborhood that’s on another table. (I think of the little gap between each table, where the electrical cords have to run, as a deep chasm with water running through the bottom. My Snow Village is a city built on the banks of an old, old river.) At one end of the residential street are the snootier homes. The lower income area is at the other, where the houses are about $30K cheaper, and the yards are a mess...

Other people see a bunch of folding tables with sheets over them, topped with ceramic houses and figures. I see life, danger, and happiness. I could stand there and look at Snow Village and tell stories to myself for an hour each day.

....

read on
http://www.charlaineharris.com/bb/bb_current.html